DOCSLIB.ORG

Irish Political Review, October 2009

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Irish Political Review, October 2009 'What If' Lynch Had A Revolting Fantasy Irish Militarism Attacked Britain? (review of Hanley/Millar) Labour Comment pages 8,9 page 14 back page IRISH POLITICAL REVIEW October 2009 Vol.24, No.10 ISSN 0790-7672 and Northern Star incorporating Workers' Weekly Vol.23 No.10 ISSN 954- 5891 News From Nowhere LISBON REFERENDUM: The leader of the SDLP is to resign the leadership of the party after the next election. Ireland Toes The Line He will contest his Westminster seat, relinquish his Stormont seat and attempt to make it a principle that the "dual mandate" of holding seats at both Stormont and Westminster Lisbon II was a demeaning affair. The should be ended. whole idea of refusing to recognise a The leader of the Liberal Democrats, who expects to hold the balance of power at referendum result and insisting on another Westminster next year, says that, with the devolved system now established, the was an insult and a clear indication that Northern. Ireland Office of the Whitehall Government should be abolished. Ireland is not taken seriously in the EU. The DUP, which dragged its heels on the implementation of the Good Friday The enthusiasm of the Government and Agreement a couple of years ago while waiting for the flighty Tony Blair to be replaced most of the political class in accepting the by the sound Presbyterian Scot, Gordon Brown, was disillusioned by Brown and is now need to rerun it confirms that there is no delaying the devolution of Justice and Policing powers while waiting for the Tories to need to take the country seriously and it take over from New Labour. will not be taken seriously from now on— Brown had to pull out of a Commemoration meeting for Trade Union leader Jack least of all in the EU. Jones in order to go to Belfast and try to get the DUP to implement the agreement on the The EU has changed fundamentally devolution of policing. He did not succeed. and it is now driven by the larger Member While the leader of the DUP refuses to implement the policing agreement for Unionist States as they see fit. There used to be a reasons, the DUP Finance Minister appeals to Dublin for Northern representation on the 'community method' of doing things as NAMA (National Assets Management Agency) Board, one aim of which is to prevent exemplified and practised by the Commis- a collapse of property prices under the influence of the market by taking over major sion and its approach. All members were building projects and assets from the banks under a system of anticipated future prices. equal and treated accordingly and Over the past decade there has been heavy investment by Southern business in property agreement reached by consensus. Now in the North, and a fundamentalist Unionist wants representation in the Southern rescue the President of the Commission is not system. And the Southern Finance Minister, a member of Fianna Fail: The Republican even sure how many Commissioners there Party, refuses. (Report, IT 9.9.09.) will be or should be. During his visit here The Irish Labour Party, under Stickie leadership, has in recent times been doing its "Mr Barroso said there was no agreement best to break off the slight engagement in the political life of the North which it undertook yet on a proposal by Sweden to allow 26 a few years ago. Yet the Stickie leader of the Party suddenly engages with internal member states to retain a commissioner Northern affairs by needling Sinn Fein (Provo) in its Northern dimension over the lower and give the 27th country the right to minimum wage prevailing in the area "where you are in government" (23.9.09 IT: The appoint a new EU high representative for respective levels are ¤8.65 and ¤6.32). foreign affairs. 'There are different Fianna Fail under Bertie Ahern opened up the prospect of extending its organisation scenarios. Some people say we should to the North. Then under Brian Cowen it closed down that prospect. And now, have a commission of 15 members. It's too apparently under grass roots pressure, the organisation of Fianna Fail branches in the soon to speculate,' he added" (IT, 19.9.09). to page 5, column 2 to page 2 Labour and the excluding Employer/Trade Union rep- governance or public administration" resentatives (currently four ICTU and four (The Irish Times, 6.10.2009). destruction of FÁS IBEC) as well as the two directly-elected This is the beginning of the end of FÁS The Government has moved swiftly to FÁS Worker Directors. Together these as one of the great Social Partnership capitalise on the collapse of FÁS—the accounted for 10 of the 17 Board places. organisations with roots going back to the state training and employment agency with The Bill will instead provide for the Minis- tripartite employer-labour-state institut- an annual budget of ¤1bn.—in the wake ter for Enterprise, Trade and Employment ions established during the 1950s-60s of the resignation of its Board following a to personally select the board members in Lemass era of industrial development. year-long campaign of public vilification a "non-prescribed manner" and "in That industrial take-off owed not a little to based on the exposure of alleged corrupt- consultation with the Minister for Social a close alliance between Trade Unions ion. A draft Bill (Labour Services Amend- and Family Affairs and the Minister for and state following the re-unification of ment Bill, 2009) "leaked" to the press Education and Science". Those appointed the Trade Union movement under the showed the Government's intention to will "have experience and expertise in leadership of "Young Jim" Larkin. Larkin, establish a new Board reduced in size areas relevant to the functions of Fás" and contending with a weak Labour Party from 17 to 11 and, most significantly, in "finance, trade, commerce, corporate then in opposition and inspired by his to page 2, column 3 Afghanistan is certainly a good place C O N T E N T S where those Member States that had Page developed a bit of a conscience about News From Nowhere. Editorial 1 wanton killing can at least arrange to amend their ways as the Germans did on Lisbon: Ireland Toes The Line. Jack Lane 1 the 70th anniversary of the outbreak of Labour And The Destruction Of Fás. Philip O'Connor 1 WWII. Soon they may be reblooded Readers' Letters: Martin Meehan. S. Garland; Bowen & WW2. B.Ó Ceallaigh 3 enough to do it on their own account. Major McDowell (1923-2009). Editorial (Obituary) 4 Now Ireland is joined up to this game: and its political and moral capital in the Catalan And Anglo-Irish Identities. Manus O'Riordan 5 world used to support it. Welcome to the Death Of Muriel MacSwiney's Daughter. Note 6 new EU. Palestine's 'Friends'. Philip O'Connor (Report) 6 Jack Lane Netzarim Junction. Wilson John Haire (Poem) Shorts from the Long Fellow (Major McDowell; IT Trust; Record Of The Paper; Times Past; Unfunny Holocaust Joke) 7 Labour and FÁS 'What If' Lynch Had Attacked Britain? Editorial 8 continued father's life work and the political legacy Incursion Not Invasion. Edward Longwill (Review) 9 of Connolly, insisted on organised labour Prof. Hart On Rebel Cork. Jack Lane 10 co-determining the shape of the Irish National Anthems And Emblems. Manus O'Riordan 11 industrial programme. A Revolting Fantasy. Brendan Clifford 14 The ethos of the FÁS organisation can Biteback: Ireland And The Two World Wars. Philip O'Connor 16 be judged by its reaction to the collapse of Does It Stack Up? Michael Stack (Statistics; NAMA; Lisbon Treaty) 19 the construction industry—over the last John Curtin. Patrick O'Beirne 20 year it has "arranged" for 400 electrical Casement 2008. Tim O'Sullivan (Part 1 of report) 21 apprentices made redundant from the building sector by the recession to com- The Ford Job-Cull. Seán McGouran 23 plete their apprenticeships with another Non. Wilson John Haire (Poem on Lisbon) 23 "semi-state" corporation, the ESB. Indeed, by 2007 FÁS was overseeing the training of over 30,000 apprentices in Irish industry, Labour Comment, edited by Pat Maloney: with an annual intake of nearly three times Irish Militarism by Pat Maloney the figure of a decade previously (see FÁS It's That Time Again, poem on Afghanistan by Wilson John Haire annual reports, on www.fas.ie). (back page) A relentless campaign has been waged against the agency by anti-state forces in the Republic. The "scandals" revealed by Senator Shane Ross in the Sunday Inde- Now it is the intergovernmental method the focus of the new EU and the new which is in control and that means it is the President will be its cutting edge. Already pendent in November 2008 were simply a big boys who count, naturally, and they we know what to expect even if Mr. Blair call to arms to close in for the kill. will decide for Mr. Barroso how many does not get the job. No need to speculate— Commissioners there will be and what just get the maps out to locate the next The Board of FÁS which has just they should do. Mr Sarkozy, for example, 'crisis.' resigned was chaired by Peter McLoone, has shown many times how he approaches The following figures show the line-up the highly regarded General Secretary of things and it is not via EU consensus. of existing combatants in Afghanistan the public services union, IMPACT, and "Tired by the slow pace of EU justice from the EU and applicant countries: former President of ICTU.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • First Impression
    A report on the HSNPF exhibition and conference in the Burlington Hotel, Dublin, on 1st December 2004 Item Type Report Authors Health Services National Partnership Forum Rights HSNPF Download date 28/09/2021 20:16:38 Link to Item http://hdl.handle.net/10147/43451 Find this and similar works at - http://www.lenus.ie/hse first impression Job number: 35681 Proof number: #05 Date received from client: 18.05.05 Date returned to client: 20.05.05 Designer/Producer: DG designers A Report on the HSNPF Exhibition and Conference in the Burlington Hotel, Dublin, on 1st December 2004 Excellence Through Workplace Partnership This DVD contains all of the speeches and presentations made Conference Presentations: on the day, together with a sample of the exhibition activity. Chapter 6: Des Geraghty, ICTU Executive Council Member The full DVD runs for close to three hours, however, each chapter Productive Partnership in the Health Services can be accessed separately and may prove useful for reference or (19 minutes) for training purposes. Chapter 7: Lucy Fallon-Byrne, Director, NCPP The Impact of Partnership Approaches to Changes in the Irish Health Services Chapter 1: Introduction – Larry Walsh, Director, (20 minutes) Health Services National Partnership Forum (HSNPF) Chapter 8: Damien Thomas, National Co-Ordinator, NCPP (2 minutes) Information and Consultation – Case Study Reviews of Current Practice Chapter 2: Opening of the Exhibition and Conference by (26 minutes) An Tánaiste Mary Harney, T.D., Minister for Health and Children Chapter 9: Isobel Butler,
    [Show full text]
  • D R O'connor Lysaght an Appreciation from an ILHS
    D R O’Connor Lysaght an Appreciation from an ILHS Perspective. The death has occurred of Rayner (Daniel) O'Connor Lysaght, Killester, Dublin Rayner (Daniel) O’Connor Lysaght passed away Friday, 2nd July, in Beaumont Hospital after a prolonged illness. He was the eldest son of Arthur Lysaght, surgeon, and Jacqueline Lysaght (née Heard) from Wales. Sadly, missed by his loving wife Aine, his brother William, sister Priscilla Stewart, brothers-in-law, sisters- in-law, friends, and comrades from around the world. Rayner was a revolutionary Marxist, a historian and author. He lived to make this quote from Trotsky a reality: “Life is beautiful. Let the future generations cleanse it of all evil, oppression, and violence, and enjoy it to the full.” Dr Kieran Jack McGinley, immediate past President of the ILHS. I knew Rayner for over 40 years, but first began to work closely with him when I joined the ILHS in 1993. He has been a committee member for over 20 years, recently re-elected at a Zoom AGM, he never sought high office but was always prepared to be the Soldier or Sherpa, doing whatever was necessary for the Society. I particularly appreciated his work during my two terms as President of the Society from 2001 to 2004-5 & 2014-15 to 2019- 2020. I also worked with Rayner in my position as Principal of Umiskin Press, in which he contributed with his editing and introduction to Matt Merrigan Seniors Biography ‘Eggs & Rashers- Irish Socialist Memories’, a Chapter in Left Lives in Twentieth Century Ireland (Volume 1) with an essay on Sean Dowling 1885-1948 – The Irish Soviet Man and in Left Lives 3 with an essay on Walter Carpenter 1871-1926 ‘The First Irish Communist’.
    [Show full text]
  • Congress Team to Meet with EU Unions
    • Meet the first time TDs Page 8 – Interview with new Tasc director Page 18 – TUF Membership Service Page 32 Vol. 10 No.3 March 2011 ISSN 0791-458X IRELAND Victory at the Davenport P3 NEEDS A Battling Mortgage Slavery P10 ‘NEWCongress team DEAL’ to meet Report on HSE Skills with EU unions By FRANK CONNOLLY Fund THE Irish Congress of Trade Unions is to meet contracted by 1% last year. Marshall Aid programme. They are insisting on with key trade union leaders across the Commenting on the figures, SIPTU and piling misery on misery in the hope of appeas- P16/17 European Union this week as part of an initia- Congress president, Jack O’Connor said they ing those at the top of the major European tive designed to secure a new financial deal for confirmed the trade union view that austerity banks which are now exposed to the debts of Ireland. measures and cutbacks were a recipe for fur- the peripheral countries as a result of their It comes as pressure grows from the most ther recession forcing working people into reckless lending during the boom years,” Jack powerful Eurozone countries on the deeper poverty, unemployment and job inse- O’Connor said. Government to make further concessions on curity. “The right of centre leaders of Germany and the Irish corporate tax rate and to intensify “We have argued that economic stimulus France, in particular, have concocted a ‘com- already failed austerity measures. and a strategy for growth are the only way out petitiveness pact’ as a condition of underwrit- The delegation, led by Congress president, of the crisis caused by the recklessness of ing loans to enable countries like Greece, Jack O’Connor, and general secretary, David bankers, government mis-management and Ireland, Portugal and Spain to limp on from Begg, will meet with the Confederation of the failure of regulation.
    [Show full text]
  • Trotskyists Debate Ireland Workers’ Liberty Volume 3 No 45 October 2014 £1 Reason in Revolt Trotskyists Debate Ireland 1939, Mid-50S, 1969
    Trotskyists debate Ireland Workers’ Liberty Volume 3 No 45 October 2014 £1 www.workersliberty.org Reason in revolt Trotskyists debate Ireland 1939, mid-50s, 1969 1 Workers’ Liberty Trotskyists debate Ireland Introduction: freeing Marxism from pseudo-Marxist legacy By Sean Matgamna “Since my early days I have got, through Marx and Engels, Slavic peoples; the annihilation of Jews, gypsies, and god the greatest sympathy and esteem for the heroic struggle of knows who else. the Irish for their independence” — Leon Trotsky, letter to If nonetheless Irish nationalists, Irish “anti-imperialists”, Contents Nora Connolly, 6 June 1936 could ignore the especially depraved and demented charac - ter of England’s imperialist enemy, and wanted it to prevail In 1940, after the American Trotskyists split, the Shachtman on the calculation that Catholic Nationalist Ireland might group issued a ringing declaration in support of the idea of gain, that was nationalism (the nationalism of a very small 2. Introduction: freeing Marxism from a “Third Camp” — the camp of the politically independent part of the people of Europe), erected into absolute chauvin - revolutionary working class and of genuine national liberation ism taken to the level of political dementia. pseudo-Marxist legacy, by Sean Matgamna movements against imperialism. And, of course, the IRA leaders who entered into agree - “What does the Third Camp mean?”, it asked, and it ment with Hitler represented only a very small segment of 5. 1948: Irish Trotskyists call for a united replied: Irish opinion, even of generally anti-British Irish opinion. “It means Czech students fighting the Gestapo in the The presumption of the IRA, which literally saw itself as Ireland with autonomy for the Protestant streets of Prague and dying before Nazi rifles in the class - the legitimate government of Ireland, to pursue its own for - rooms, with revolutionary slogans on their lips.
    [Show full text]
  • 'DEFEND the UNIONS' Does SWP Know How?
    'DEFEND THE UNIONS' Does SWP know how? AS THE TORIES shape up to deliver their onslaught on the working class, the leaders of the TUC have begun clamouring for talks with Thatcher and for consultations en the budget with Howe. Ciearly the union leaders want to be seen to have had some say in the attacks on their members, the better to dampen the likely militant response to the Tory offensive from the rank and file. In this situation, and in the wake of the betrayals under tbe Labour Government in the form of the Social Contract and theConcordat, it is crucial that the unions be taken out of the hands of the bureaucrats. To achieve this, a movement Its invitation hitter fails to invite must be built inside the unions resolutions or proposed policies and based on the r'ank and file. from trade union bodies, or even The Socialist Workers Party to say whether such things will te (SWP), sensing the likely upturn allowed; the "ideas and resolut­ in industrial struggle under the ions" promised from the organ­ ORGANISE TO Tories, have called a conference isers have failed to materialise of their Rank and File Organis- less than a month before the ation for the 23rd June under the conference,' guaranteeing no chance title of "Defend Our Unions". for discussion amongst the This forum could serve as a delegating bodies. We are heading valuable rallying focus for for yet another SWP controlled militants inthe prelude to a show­ rally. down with the Tories over jobs, cuts, The reaons for this don't just ~ ~~ BEAT -TORY wages and un ion rights.
    [Show full text]
  • P29 John De Courcy Ireland Papers
    John de Courcy Ireland Papers P29 UCD Archives School of History and Archives archives @ucd.ie www.ucd.ie/archives T + 353 1 716 7555 F + 353 1 716 1146 © 1977 University College Dublin. All rights reserved ii CONTENTS Introduction iv A. LABOUR PARTY 1942-74 I Secretary of Central Branch, Dublin, 1942-3 1 II General Labour Party Business, 1966-74 1 III Local Matters 8 IV Newspapers 11 V Pamphlets 11 B. EDUCATION 1949-74 I Vocational Education Committee 12 II Teaching Career 15 C. CONTEMPORARY ISSUES AND ORGANISATIONS, 1945-74 24 D. JOURNALISM, 1945-74 I Articles 37 II Correspondence 40 E. MARITIME 1964-74 44 F. PRINTED MATERIAL 1937-74 46 G. PERSONAL MATERIAL 1939-75 50 iii Introduction John de Courcy Ireland, the only child of a British army officer, was born in India on 19 October 1911. His father was killed fighting in World War One. The de Courcy Ireland family was formerly of Robertstown, Co. Kildare. John de Courcy Ireland was educated at a Church of Ireland school in London and at Marlborough College. Both school experiences proved unhappy and at the age of seventeen, John de Courcy Ireland left school in search of adventure. He obtained a job as a steward on a cargo-ship bound for South America and did not return to England until c. 1930. It was this experience which stirred the forces which were to dominate his life –the sea, socialism and a feeling of internationalism with its allied interest in history, culture and languages. John de Courcy Ireland speaks six languages.
    [Show full text]
  • North-South Health Services Conference: Working Together for Better Health Services
    North-South health services conference: working together for better health services Item Type Report Authors Health Services National Partnership Forum Rights HSNPF Download date 02/10/2021 21:49:31 Link to Item http://hdl.handle.net/10147/43474 Find this and similar works at - http://www.lenus.ie/hse North-South Health Services Conference Working Together for Better Health Services North-South Health Services Conference Includes the proceedings of a conference held on Thursday 28 June 2001 in Dublin, addressed by Micheál Martin T.D. Minister for Health and Children and Bairbre de Brún MLA, Minister for Health, Social Services and Public Safety Contents PREFACE Inez McCormack, President, Irish Congress of Trade Unions 2 Matt Merrigan, Health Services National Partnership Forum KEYNOTE ADDRESSES Micheál Martin, T.D. 3 Minister for Health and Children 1 Bairbre de Brún, MLA 9 Minister for Health, Social Services and Public Safety North-South Health Services Conference AN IRISH PERSPECTIVE 13 Employment Trends and the Health Services Gerard Hughes Economic and Social Research Institute AN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVE 32 Experiences of the New York SEIU/Health Industry Project Deborah King 1199/League Employment, Training and Job Security Program A UK PERSPECTIVE 36 Jonathan Swallow Swallow Consulting PARTNERSHIP IN ACTION 42 A presentation on the experiences of Beaumont Hospital and the Royal Hospitals WORKSHOP SESSION 47 NEXT STEPS 50 CONFERENCE REGISTRATION 53 Preface Health Services North and South are widely acknowledged as being in crisis and facing radical change. Both health systems are failing to produce the outcomes needed for a modern and inclusive economy – despite everyone working in them doing the best they can.
    [Show full text]
  • November 2008 Americanisation and Irish Industrial Development 1948
    Americanisation and Irish Industrial Development 1948 - 2008 No 42 – November 2008 Peter Murray NIRSA Working Paper Series Americanisation and Irish Industrial Development, 1948-2008 Peter Murray Department of Sociology / National Institute for Regional and Spatial Analysis National University of Ireland, Maynooth, Ireland Department of Sociology NUI Maynooth County Kildare Ireland 00-353-1-7083594 [email protected] Abstract Over the past sixty years, the Republic of Ireland has experienced two forms of americanisation. One of these was aid during the early post-war decades from the US government or from European agencies that owed their existence to US government funding, like the European Productivity Agency. The second was investment by US private corporations that began to increase in importance from the late 1960s. This paper notes some contrasts between the two. The early period was one in which a productivity drive was unsuccessfully attempted: the latter was one in productivity statistics were rendered increasingly incredible by the transfer pricing indulged in by multinational corporations. European `free’ (as opposed to `red’) trade unions were promoted by US government policy against a Cold War backdrop but, as US corporate investment has becomes increasingly important, Irish unions in the private sector came to experience the same `slow strangulation’ that was being visited on their US counterparts. Introduction It is now sixty years since Marshall Aid introduced industrial Technical Assistance and Productivity (TA&P) programmes to Ireland in 1948 (Whelan 2000: Murray 2008). This flow of aid ceased in 1952 when Ireland would not adhere to the conditions attached to its provision by the US Mutual Security Act.
    [Show full text]
  • A Very Political Project: Charles Haughey, Social Partnership and the Pursuit of an “Irish Economic Miracle”, 1969-92
    Dublin City University School of Law and Government A Very Political Project: Charles Haughey, Social Partnership and the pursuit of an “Irish economic miracle”, 1969-92 By Philip O’Connor Thesis completed under the supervision of Prof. Gary Murphy in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Dublin City University, School of Law and Government January 2020 Declaration I hereby certify that this material, which I now submit for assessment on the programme of study leading to the award of Doctor of Philosophy is entirely my own work, and that I have exercised reasonable care to ensure that the work is original, does not to the best of my knowledge breach any law of copyright, and has not been taken from the work of others save and to the extent that such work has been cited and acknowledged within the text of my work. Signed: ________________ (Candidate) DCU ID: 54160707 Date: 6th Jan. 2020 Table of Contents Table of Contents 3 Acknowledgements 6 Abstract 7 Introduction 8 Chapter 1: Theoretical contentions and competing literatures Contentions 14 The political economy of policy change 15 Policy and partnership in the economic transformation 19 Ireland’s social partnership in comparative analyses 22 Other literature 24 Part 1: Leaps, Bounds and Reversals, 1945-86 29 Chapter 2: The quest for socio-economic organisation, 1945-70 Irish politics and economic interests before 1945 30 Fits and starts: Irish “tripartitism” 1945-56 36 Lemass’s economic institutionalism 1957-63 40 System stresses: from expansion to dissolution
    [Show full text]
  • Saothar Index.Pdf
    .~ . -. ,i. '. J , . ,t'_· "';.. .,. ~ I 7~ l. t /' .'" .,' "'j - 1.'.'- .. ". " .. ;pubJi~h~d.~ith th~i~'~;poi~ bL 'l!!riMi!!J ," ..... .... >MSPc .' '". l'- ~ -~ ... ~ • I ' ? " Cu~ann Stair Lu{'hl Saothair na hEireann Journal ~f the Irish Labour History ~Iety Saothar 3 An Index to Sabthar 1973-2000 ISSN 1393-9831 SA01~hAR 17 sAorhAR 18 ,,' -An Index To 'I I I.' SAOTHf\R Journal Of The Irish Labour' History Society "".,..,.:.: And Other ILHS Publications, 1973-2000 ') . "' :~" ;. ~,:' compiled by Francis Devine , .,,- :' Irish Labour History Society: Saothar Studies 1, 2000 . "~.: " . ~ " "'-::.. .... 11 l' ~ first published by the Irish Labour History Society Beggars Bush, Haddington Road, Dublin 4, Ireland' September 2000 ISSN \393-9831 with the support of MSF designed and printed by Elo Press Ltd., Dublin 8 front cover: . The typeface design for Saothar was by Peter Biddulph, a graduate of the National College Of Art And' Design. Saothar 5, 1979 was the first appearance of this typeface in print. , :" . • <~; .. back cover: Ancient trade banner of the Dublin Letter Press Printers, painted in the early nineteenth century and already 'well worn in 1875 when £20 had to be spent preparing for the O'Connell Centenary; Lii~t· public appearance was Connolly Commemmoration, May 1930. Theme of Christmas card issued by Dublin's Typographical Building Society in 1950s. Illustrated inside cover of Saothar 12, 1997. Contents Introduction 5 Saothar And Its Contribution To Irish Historical Studies by 1. 1. Lee 8 Saothar, The Irish Labour History
    [Show full text]
  • A Marvellous Legacy
    Matt Merrigan A marvellous legacy Michael O’Reilly Matt Merrigan has written on his early days, and I’m hoping to get the work published. He was born in the Dolphin’s Barn area of Dublin in 1921. I know he took an interest in the Spanish civil war, and was aware of what was happening at the time. He came from a large family and his father died when he was very young, so he knew what poverty was like as a direct experience in his life. However, the poverty of the area and these experiences could not explain his commit- ment to a socialism which lasted his whole life and never dimmed. He was in a variety of organisations, but his consistency is there through the whole lot of them, and that can’t simply be explained by the poverty. He made a commitment in his early life to the socialist movement and he never varied from that. He was unusual in the sense that in the 1930s he considered the October revolution to be the greatest thing that happened in the twentieth century. He was committed to the Left Opposition: he never changed his views on that. Not with the massive advance of the Soviet Union after the war, with the huge advances of all the Communist Parties—it never dimmed Matty’s view that the Soviet Union needed more democracy and participation, and this view stayed with him in a variety of organisations right through his life. He was certainly involved with socialists in Belfast in the late 1930s and early 1940s.
    [Show full text]
  • Irish-Soviet Diplomatic and Friendship Relations, 1919-80
    Irish-Soviet diplomatic and friendship relations, 1919-80 by Michael Joseph Quinn THESIS FOR THE DEGREE OF PhD DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF IRELAND MAYNOOTH Head of Department: Professor Marian Lyons SUPERVISOR OF RESEARCH: Professor Jacqueline Hill January 2014 i Table of contents Abstract iii Declaration iv Acknowledgments v List of abbreviations vi Introduction 1 Chapter one: Irish-Soviet diplomatic affairs, 1919-72 15 Chapter two: The establishment and practice of Irish-Soviet diplomatic relations, 1971-80 60 Chapter three: An account of Irish-Soviet friendship organisations, with a principal focus on the Ireland-U.S.S.R. Society, founded in 1966 122 Chapter four: Ambassador Brennan’s island of Ireland political reports 177 from Moscow to the Department of Foreign Affairs, Dublin, 1974-80 Chapter five: Irish-Soviet relations in the context of European Political Cooperation, 1974-80 226 Conclusion 270 Appendix 1: A register of Ambassador Brennan’s political reports 282 (P.R.s) from Moscow to the Department of Foreign Affairs, Dublin, 1974-80 Appendix 2: A register of the records of Irish involvement in the Eastern Europe Working Group (E.E.W.G.), 1974-80. 312 Bibliography 326 ii Abstract This thesis offers a contribution to Irish historiography with a study of Ireland’s diplomatic and friendship relations with the Soviet Union in the ‘short Soviet twentieth- century’. To date no such study has been produced. The study has as its central focus developments surrounding the establishment of formal diplomatic relations between the two states in 1973, and considers aspects of how those relations evolved down to 1980.
    [Show full text]